After-Take: GRIMM “Tree People”

GRIMM — “Tree People” Episode 609 — Pictured: (l-r) Reggie Lee as Sergeant Wu, Silas Weir Mitchell as Monroe, Bree Turner as Rosalee Calvert, David Giuntoli as Nick Burkhardt, Russell Hornsby as Hank Griffin — (Photo by: Allyson Riggs/NBC)

Name of the Episode: “Tree People”

AirDate: Friday, March 3

Monroe goes to the loft to hear more about Eve’s encounter with the demon in the mirror. Adalind, Wu, Hank and Rosalee also join in the case. Adalind suspects the demon is coming after Eve because she’s seen it twice in the mirror. Diana also has a thought saying what they see isn’t a dream, it’s real, but somewhere in the middle. Rosalee offers to let Eve stay with them until they figure out the full situation. In the forest, hunters try to shoot a deer. The shooter is successful, but before he can cut into the deer, vines come out and grab him from the ankles and drags him away.

His buddy chases after him and watches as a branch pierces through his friend’s body. He sees a tree figure holding his friend and shoots at it, but shoots his friend in the head instead. He gets to his car and tries to escape but he crashes his car into a tree. At the loft, Nick is worried that hexenbeist are the ones being targeted by the demon. They are keeping a towel over the mirror and Adalind won’t look into a mirror unless he’s with her. Just then Wu calls about the car crash in the woods. The call should have been DUI, but the Ralph is refusing to go into the ambulance and leave. He keeps saying a monster killed his friend the night before.

The sheriffs aren’t taking it seriously, so Nick and Hank come to the scene. Ralph takes them step by step of what happened insisting he didn’t kill his friend. They so far think it’s possible Ralph is trying to cover up his friends’ murder, or wesen are involved. At the spice shop, Monroe and Rosalee show Eve the mirror they’ve kept locked up. Rosalee insists the mirror isn’t magic in any way, but they see the mirror begin to bleed. Monroe takes the mirror and locks it back up. Eve decides to take Diana’s advice and wants to go to the demon. Find out where he is instead of him coming to find her in their world. At the precinct, Dev and Ralph both have records for low charges.

Nick thinks Ralph mistook Dev as the monster. Dev isn’t the first person to go missing in that area. Hikers and others have gone missing prior and there was never any suicide notes or wills after their disappearance. So, they go into the interrogation room to question Ralph more. Ralph sticks to his story insisting they’re wasting time with him and need to find the thing that killed Dev.

Wu interrupts the interview with medical results from Ralph’s blood stained shirt. The results came up with large amounts of sap and things that can only be found in a tree. At Renard’s office, Dasha calls back with more information. He informs her that Diana’s powers are more than him and Adalind combined. Dasha says the symbols are a combination of ancient and some possibly from Diana’s imagination. Nick and Hank go back to the spice shop to describe what Ralph saw. Rosalee thinks it might be a wesen that was from Brazil, a Corapera. Some nature wesen are hardwired to protect their territory. If someone is ruining their land, they will punish the offender. Hank finds a Japanese wesen that seems to fit their description, a Kiminshimoba. Their victims are never recovered and it’s possible they don’t woge.

They might always be in protector mode, ready to guard their territory. Their research is interrupted by Wu saying they needed to come back to the station. Over the years there have been ten disappearances; all the victims had crimes against nature. Whether that be pollution, poaching or littering. An older woman goes out to the woods with a large amount of waste to dispose of while she was smoking. She took a nap in her lawn chair and awoke to vines taking her ankles and working up her body. The tree pierced its branch through her and sacrificed her to a larger tree trunk. The next day, Hank, Wu and Nick go back into the woods searching for clues. Wu sees a vehicle beyond the trees and goes to investigate. He finds the lawn chair with blood, and also the toxic waste streaming from the truck.

Patricia Vetvark is registered to the truck left in the woods and has been charged with dumping toxic waste all over the state. They make marks on a map showing where their victims went missing hoping to see a perimeter. Once they find the center, they get back to where Nick saw a large tree, and was intrigued by its shape. Upon taking a closer look, they begin to see faces. Each face they saw was a match to their missing victims. Rosalee sees the faces in the trees and realizes what it is. She identifies it as a Juboko, a tree that survives on human’s blood. Their plan is to take a mixture only harmful to wesen with scales and pour it around the tree to draw out the helper tree to the Juboko. With no effects, they ask Rosalee to spike the ingredients a little bit. She brings over turpentine to them, but hits a bad bump which pierces her gas tank and causes it to leak. She gets out of the car to inspect it, and while on the phone with Monroe hears the tree monster behind her.

She runs off and finally meets up with the rest of the group. The Juboko tries to take Rosalee with its vine, but Nick cuts her loose. Then it’s helper comes by the take the rest of them, but Nick uses his ax to stab the monster and it releases its grip on everyone. It’s taken into the Juboko and entombed. Everyone takes it as a win and goes back to the spice shop to write their experiences for future Grimms.

Next week, Eve is convinced her and Nick will be able to kill the demon haunting her through the mirror. Only three more episodes until the epic series finale!